Out In The Cold
by mandolin28
Summary: When Rachel's flight home for Christmas is cancelled, it's Finn to the rescue, even if neither are thrilled about it. Emotions are still raw and their little road trip is far from a happy one especially when a wrong turn on a snowy night lands them in an empty cabin where they are forced to face their demons and discover that being mad and not caring are two very different things.


**So, the morning I started this, I had woken up from an extremely vivid dream featuring our dear Finchel. At some point in the dream, I think they were way back in the past (Finn was on a horse? That part was vague... sexy as you know what though!) It was modern time by the end and that's the setting I'm focusing on. I really think they were in some sort of Vancouver wilderness (if there is such a thing), it was snowing hard, and they were caught in it somehow. They were fighting about something (not sure what) quite passionately and were making up with an epic kiss when I woke up... There were so many little details that I just HAD to turn it into a story even if just a one shot! **

**This fic assumes two important things:**

**Swan Song phone call didn't happen. (I know... :( But go with me here!)**

**Glee, Actually didn't happen. This did. Enjoy!**

It had been exactly three hours and twenty seven minutes since anyone had uttered a word. Neither of them had expected nor wanted to be in this position, but as luck would have it, life didn't particularly care what they wanted. God knows it had proved that to them time and time again. Finn drove down the seemingly never ending highway, jaw clenched, knuckles white as he gripped the wheel almost hard enough to snap the thing in two. Rachel sat, body shielded by her arms wrapped around herself, her head turned as far away from him as possible, staring out her window taking in the the frigid Pennsylvania landscape. Both of them were thinking about how they had gotten into this nightmare to begin with.

_Burt had wanted to surprise Kurt for Christmas by bringing the remainder of his things from home, in addition to a new flat screen as a gift for the loft. He also wanted to experience his son's life in New York for the couple of days he was able to take off from work. He had worked it out so that Carole would fly up on Christmas day after spending the holiday with Finn and their family. The plan was set and Finn had only agreed to step foot across the New York state border because he had been assured that Rachel would already be gone on a cruise with her dads. So, imagine his shock (and journey through emotional hell) when he stepped into the loft only to be greeted by a stunned and clearly flustered Rachel whose dads had postponed said cruise a couple of days because of business. Terse hellos were exchanged before Rachel hastily retreated to her room, leaving Finn and the other two very uncomfortable men to their business. Since the plan included an overnight stay, Finn took the couch. Rachel only came out one time to go to the bathroom and then disappeared again, trying to give him what he had asked for: no contact. But, that's not really what he wanted so much as he needed it to heal the gaping hole that losing her had left behind. Finn dozed off while staring at the curtains that separated him from the girl he equally loved with all his heart and wanted less than anything to see. Because it suffocated him every time he did. His mind wandered to the last time he was within these walls. Hope had turned to hopeless faster than he really even had time to process and led to this despair he currently resided in. Closing his eyes and giving into sleep, he sighed, how drastically things had changed. She had moved on so quickly that it made their time together seem like nothing more than a very vivid dream. An amazing dream. As the sunlight streamed into the room, awakening him, he saw that he was lying under a blanket that wasn't there when he had fallen asleep. He immediately recognized the blanket and a small smile fell upon his face. He lifted it to his nose. Rachel. Maybe it wasn't a dream after all. _

_He smelled the coffee next, craning his neck back to find her in the kitchen. She was already dressed, in all black (who died?) and those knee boots that he had to admit were something new that he could definitely appreciate. But, he couldn't see his Rachel. It was like she was lost in there somewhere and his stomach turned at the thought that he may never get her back. It wasn't that he wouldn't allow her to change. Change was expected. Change was healthy. But this total transformation was killing him. He watched her move around the space and wanted so badly to just stalk over there and tell her how stupid this was, feel her next to him, even if just for a moment._

"_Are you going to speak or just stare from a distance?" she asked suddenly, pulling him out of his daydream. Her tone wasn't flirtatious. It wasn't harsh. It was just a question._

_Finn cleared his throat and felt the heat in his cheeks from his blush of embarrassment. He sat up slowly and ran a hand through his hair. "Sorry, didn't realize I was staring," he said, unsure of what to say exactly._

_Rachel simply shrugged and went back to her cup of coffee. A long, awkward silence followed. _

"_Uh... thanks. You know. For the blanket."_

_Another shrug. "You looked cold when I came for a drink of water in the middle of the night. I would have done it for any of our guests."_

_Finn flinched. So, now he was just any other guest to her? How the hell had they gotten here? He felt like he never meant anything to her. Was what they shared not as special to her? Had she moved on so far that she had forgotten him completely? Or had he simply hurt her so badly that she felt the need to protect herself from him? It was the sneaking suspicion that the latter was at least part of it that made him feel like he was going to be sick. Whatever it was, her indifference toward him was tearing him apart. He'd rather her be steaming mad, mean even, than indifferent and cold. It just didn't fit with the Rachel he knew. She felt strongly about everything. Never indifferent. Her phone rang, breaking the trance he was in and he took the opportunity to make his way to the bathroom. He wondered if he could just stay in there until he heard Burt and Kurt wake up to avoid the torturous awkwardness, but then he thought better of it, not wanting to explain what took so long. When he finally mustered up the courage to walk back out into the room, Rachel was sitting on the couch with her face in her hands. His natural instinct kicked in (or maybe it was that damn tether) and he quickly walked over to her and touched her shoulder, causing Rachel to jump and turn to face him. Her cheeks were tear streaked._

"_What's wrong?" he asked softly._

"_Nothing," she replied, standing and moving away from him._

"_Right. Because you always cry when nothing is wrong," he mumbled._

_She let out a resigned sigh. "Fine. That was the airline. My flight out of JFK has been cancelled due to icy conditions. Which means that I can't fly home. Which means that I can't meet my dads. Which means I won't make it in time to go on this cruise. Looks like Christmas alone in New York."_

_They sat in silence, Rachel throwing herself back on the couch, resigning herself to her fate and Finn trying to fight his first inclination which was to come to the rescue. But, as he watched her, her eyes closed, sadness taking over her features, he knew that he was going to give in to it, no matter how badly he could potentially be destroyed by it._

"_That's not going to happen," he said with confidence. Rachel opened her eyes and looked up at him incredulously._

"_It's sweet of you to try to make me feel better, Finn, but it is going to happen. Unless you can produce a flight out of here." _

"_Well, I can't get you a flight, but I can give you a ride."_

"_What?" Rachel sat up slowly._

"_I'm leaving in a few hours for home. I can at least get you to your dads and then maybe they can rearrange their travel plans so you can go with them."_

"_You'd do that for me?" she asked, unbelieving given their recent circumstances, tears forming over the sweetness that was Finn and the feelings it always stirred inside her heart._

_He gave her a look that said "seriously?" "Rachel. C'mon. You know I'll always do pretty much anything for you," he rolled his eyes with a grin._

_She let the tears fall, overwhelmed by his words and who he was and would always be for her. And in that moment, even though it was just the offer of a ride to a destination he was already going, she wondered why it was that she let him go. Yes she was mad and she had every right to be, but right now it all seemed so not right. "Finn," was all she could say as an intensity passed between their locked eyes. Something shifted and they both felt the oh so familiar pull. Just as Rachel was reaching her hand over to rest on his, there was a knock at the door. The moment lost, Finn took a deep breath and watched her walk away to the door. Of course it was Mr. Abercrombie and Fitch USA coming to give her a surprise escort to the airport. Of course. And just like that the spell was broken and every wall between them that had just been weakened, returned with renewed strength._

A few very unpleasant exchanges, several hours, and a new set of defenses later and here they were. Trapped in this two door prison together. If they had their way, no one would utter a word until they reached Lima, but absolute necessity won out and forced them into communication.

"Are you sure you read the map right? I mean, it's been a couple of hours _at least_ since we've passed anything that looks like it might lead us toward home," Finn said, clearly irritated.

"Yes, Finn," Rachel spat, "I am perfectly capable of reading a map." She finally turned to look at him, catching his sideways glance before he returned his intense focus on the road stretched out before him. "Let's not forget that if it weren't for me, we'd still be sitting on I-80 waiting for them to clear that wreck and that could have taken hours. Hours of freezing in the cold unable to move. Instead, we are on our way home by way of detour and out of this God forsaken truck."

"Hey- don't start in on the truck just because you're pissed at me. If it weren't for this truck, you'd be sitting on your ass alone for Christmas in that oversized loft you now call home," Finn said, his voice laced with indignity. "So, instead of bitching about it, why don't you take another look at that map just in case you might be wrong. I know these days you think everything you do is golden, but, there is still a slim, small, tiny possibility you've gotten us really off course."

Rachel simply stared at him wordlessly.

Finn rolled his eyes, only looking at her briefly. "I mean on this drive... with the map. It's not, like, a metaphor or whatever so you can unclench," he said, trying to remain hard, but softening slightly out of instinct.

Rachel reluctantly went back to her map, ignoring the urge to delve further into that can of worms. He tossed her quick glances as she used her phone to look closely at the map on her phone. It was her whispered, "_damn it, _that alarmed him.

"Rachel?" he said her name as a question, afraid to hear the answer. Met with silence, he looked over to see her sitting with her head hung low, eyes closed, both lips pulled in between her teeth. This was a look he knew. That fact was of no comfort. "What?"

"I was wrong," she said, so low he barely heard her.

"I'm sorry... I didn't hear you. What was that?" he asked, knowing exactly what she had said and knowing how much it would anger her to have to say it again.

"I was wrong, Finn... OK? I told you wrong at our last turn and now we have driven approximately three hours in the wrong direction and we are going to be trapped out here in the middle of nowhere, left to die of exposure in the Pennsylvania wilderness on Christmas Eve. Are you happy now? Is that what you wanted to hear?" He could hear the genuine fear come out amidst the ire in her voice and, though everything in him was screaming at him to make it better, he also knew that it was no longer his place.

"Well... I would have preferred a much less dramatic version, but hearing you admit you were wrong did the trick," he said with a satisfied smirk.

Rachel was outraged. "This isn't funny, Finn!" she said loudly. "We are in the middle of God knows where," she leaned over to look at his gauges, "it's dark, we're running low on gas, and my phone is going to die soon."

"Well, we'd hate for Zoolander to have to leave a message, now wouldn't we?"

A brown eyes glare was boring into the side of his head. He could feel it, but dared not look directly into it. "Still sticking with the name calling?"

"Yep." He wasn't the least bit apologetic.

"I'm going to ignore the blatant childishness and irrationality of your behavior to remind you that we are currently in what we grown ups call an emergency situation."

Finn sighed and slowly pulled off onto the shoulder of the increasingly dark highway they were on. He held out his hand to her expectantly and she relinquished possession of her phone so he could try to figure out where the actual hell they had landed.

She watched his eyes go wide as he scrolled his thumb across her phone. "Oh my God, Rachel! We have been driving for three hours in the wrong damn direction! What the hell were you thinking?" His voice was rising and was met with the same volume in hers.

"I was following the little blue dot! I don't know!"

"This is just perfect. Perfect!" Finn's fist pounded the steering wheel and with the arm propped in the window, he covered his face with his hand. His anger wasn't coming from her misdirection and they both knew it.

Rachel sat quietly, sorry for her mistake, but too proud to say so. "Where are we?" she asked softly.

"Forksville, Pennsylvania. Do you know where that is?"

She shook her head.

"The middle of nowhere, Rachel, that's where we are. The middle of freaking nowhere." His voice was harder than she had ever heard from him. With a sudden jerk of the handle, he threw the truck into drive and peeled back out onto the highway.

Gripping the door in fear, Rachel watched as he accelerated. "What are we going to do? I mean, assuming we don't die in a high speed collision."

"With who? In case you haven't noticed, there are no other people on this road except us. And we wouldn't even be here if not for your stellar navigational skills."

"Alright, Finn. I get it. I screwed up. Go ahead and hate me forever for it," she said, catching the flinch that was his reaction and realizing that once again there could be a double meaning taken from those words. "With the map... unclench."

"I knew what you meant," he said quietly. "And I could never hate you. I learned that from trying to so hard for the last two months." He smirked at her and the tension that had been building was lessened when she gave a smirk back.

Just then, they saw a sign that read **WORLD'S END STATE PARK 2 MI.**

"What a creepy, yet appropriately named park," he quipped, laughing a little at her wide eyed expression.

Unlike it's moniker, the park looked like one of the nicest state parks either of them had seen. Finn followed the signs, though being that it was now 10:00 at night, there was no one there to help them. It was the dead of winter, and as if on cue, snow began to fall heavily onto the windshield. It was time to get serious. Unsure of how far they were from the next anything, Finn didn't know whether or not he had enough gas to get them as far as they would need to go. It was so dark and there was no way at 22 degrees they would be OK to just sleep in the truck. As Finn drove further into the park he saw an arrow pointing toward cabins. Looking at Rachel and coming to a silent agreement, they drove in that direction hoping to find a place to stay. The snow was already starting to accumulate, forming a light layer on the ground. Finn pulled into the spot of gravel provided and told Rachel to stay in the car while he tried to find a way in. As he expected, he heard her door open immediately and her short footsteps following him to the door. It took no more than a credit card to enter, because the dead bolt wasn't locked and they shared a conspiratorial glance. Finn let Rachel in while he returned to gather their bags.

"Finn, what if we get caught?" Rachel asked as he entered the cabin and turned on the light. She looked around and saw that it was very nice and she immediately walked to turn on the heat.

"Rachel, it's like 10:30 on Christmas Eve night, it's snowing, and the park is closed tomorrow. Who is going to catch us?" Finn laid their bags down by the door and locked both locks behind him. He made a beeline for the fire place which, fortunately already had wood inside. While he got the fire going, Rachel stood a good distance away watching him work with her arms folded for warmth. Her mind flashed to a happier time what seemed like so long ago when he had lit a fire for them and a pain hit her heart. Finn stood brushing his hands off on his jeans. Ignoring the look on her face and his knowledge of what she was thinking because he was thinking the same thing he said, "There. Should warm up pretty quickly. You should come stand over here. Warm up. I know how cold you get."

She smiled shyly, humbled by the way he knew her and still cared enough to take care of her , and followed his lead, walking to the fire and rubbing her hands together. They both stood silently staring into the blazing golden light, the only sound being the crackling of the fireplace and the wind whistling through the trees.

"I'm sorry, Finn. This is all my fault," she finally said.

"It's alright. I mean, it really is kind of all your fault, though..." he said with a chuckle earning a half hearted punch to the arm. "I'm kidding. I should have been paying more attention. If I hadn't been so lost in thought, maybe I would have noticed that we weren't getting any closer to where we needed to be."

More silence followed. But, his words brought up a question that she just couldn't let go. "What were you thinking about?"

Finn looked down at her as she remained staring into the fire. If he told her it would just stir up more ugliness and he was too tired to go there tonight.

"You don't want to know," he said as a warning. And with that statement, he walked away to carry their bags to the bedroom, leaving her rooted in place to control her emotions.

It wasn't long before she went looking for him, finding him lying, still clothed, on top of the patchwork quilt covering the queen sized bed. One arm was lying across his eyes, the other folded under his head.

"Finn?" she asked quietly.

"Hmmm?" he answered, unmoving.

"Is it OK if I sleep in here, too?" she was reluctant to ask.

"Of course," he said, still not moving for fear he would open his arms to her and welcome her into them.

Rachel turned off the light, the heat from the front room starting to filter in, warming the cabin quite nicely. She had put on a sweat shirt and leggings from her bag and noticed that Finn hadn't changed his clothes at all. She crawled under the covers next to him feeling the heat from his body so close to hers and shivering from the chill his closeness sent down her spine. And though he was mad at her, and though there was a distance between them like she had never felt before, she felt safe. She lay there wishing he would roll over and pull her against his chest like he used to, but she also knew that it wasn't going to happen. And then she remembered why and she remembered that she was mad at him, too. But, with him lying that close to her it was a lot harder to remember why.

The minute the bed dipped next to him, Finn began an internal struggle. Every bone, vein, muscle, and cell in his body wanted to pull her to him, to hold her and never let her go again. To just pretend that the last six months hadn't happened and that they were still so in love that they could conquer anything as long as they had each other. But that wasn't the world they lived in anymore. And she belonged to someone else. And his stomach turned once more.

So they lay there together, both awake in the darkness close enough to touch but so distant they couldn't see the other.

It was around 3:30 am when Rachel woke up with a chill. The warmth against her back that had lulled her to sleep was missing and she groggily rolled over to see that its source was missing as well. She stood up taking the quilt around her shoulders and jumping slightly when her socked feet hit the cold floor and quickly padded into the dark front room, finding the floor much warmer and seeing Finn's back in silhouette as he sat on the couch in front of the fire. She stood back watching him and pulled the cover around herself more tightly. She took soft tentative steps toward him.

"What are you doing out here?" she asked, her voice low and thick with sleep.

His head turned a little at the sound of her voice and then returned to its original position as he continued staring into the dying flames. "Just thinking." His answer was short and true.

Taking his reply as a peace offering she walked around to sit next to him. "Blanket?" she offered.

He gave her a small smile and shook his head. She joined him in staring straight ahead for a long time before he spoke.

"Are you still thinking about the thing I don't want to know?" she asked, giving him an second chance to share his thoughts.

"Why did you do it?" he asked suddenly, swallowing hard, well aware of what he was getting started but unable to exist one more second before getting answers to the questions that had control of his mind.

She watched him intently, his eyes never leaving the fire. Her heart stopped when he asked and she found herself frantically searching her heart for the answer. "The honest answer?"

He finally met her eyes and nodded.

"Because I could," she said matter of factly. He looked as if he needed more so she went on. "Look, I waited for you. I waited for you to come to your senses. I waited for you to realize that I was where you were supposed to be. I spent four months looking at your face, saying your name in all my conversations just to remind myself that you were real, waiting for you to show up at my door and tell me you were through running. But you didn't. You didn't even call. And I have never felt more alone in my life. I already told you that I came around to forgiving you for the train. But, all of my calls and texts and questions felt like the days of you checking under your bed 'to see if I was hiding out under there.'" His eyes apologized for his past words and hers told him there was no need. "What I mean is that it felt like I was doing all the chasing again and I started to convince myself that if you still loved me half as much as I loved you, I wouldn't have to be chasing you. And in the mean time, someone was chasing me for a change and it made me feel in control of my circumstances for the first time since I saw your face disappear on that platform. And when you showed up, I had literally just given in. I was so happy to see you and, quite frankly, ashamed of the way you found me."

Finn's body went stiff at the mention of "someone." Because it was "someone" who was the source of most of his anger.

"You asked," she said in an almost whisper.

Finn let out a humorless snicker and nodded his head with pursed lips.

"While I'm being honest, I can honestly say that the second I saw you standing in my doorway I was done with that. I was 100% yours... no matter what... right up until I woke up to talk things out with someone who didn't even offer me the courtesy of goodbye. And it was the second time you had abandoned me and I just... I..."

"Had no faith left to put in me anymore," he finished for her.

Her silence spoke volumes.

"But you could trust him?" he asked, unable to stop.

Rachel's eyes closed and she shook her head. "Don't you get it? It doesn't matter if I trust him or not. My heart isn't in it enough for it to matter-" she bit her bottom lip wanting her admission back.

Finn didn't even flinch over it. "Sure seemed to be in it after the musical," he said pointedly.

Her lips pursed and her head nodding she stood, needing to get some space. "Right. About that... You were wrong."

"What do you mean I was wrong? You basically told me I was dead on."

"No I didn't. You were only half way right and I just didn't correct you. I came to Lima with every intention of showing you how strong and in control and over you I was. That I meant what I said on that stage when I left. But seeing you shot it all to hell and I could not let you know. Wanna know what I was really crying about? My own rash decisions. My decision to end things with you so that I could be the one in the driver's seat. My decision to jump into a flirtation with someone just to mask the pain of not having you. And the fact that it was all blowing up in my face at once."

"So you just left me to believe a lie?" he said, a look of disbelief and disappointment on his face.

"What was I supposed to do, Finn? You said, 'no contact.'"

"After you let me think I didn't matter to you anymore. I only said that to get you to fight me on it. So you'd refuse and tell me I was being a baby. I thought that if I said no more contact, you'd stop being such a hard ass, but when you agreed so easily I decided that you really didn't give a damn anymore and I gave up." He finally stood, his arms thrown up in defeat.

"Yeah. Well, that's something you've gotten really good at," she threw at him, her own anger rising to the surface once again.

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, offended.

"Exactly what I said. You've gotten really good at giving up." She took in the look on his face and was still undeterred. "You've given up on me, us, most importantly, you've given up on you and that... that makes my heart sicker than anything," she was yelling now and she didn't care.

"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't, Rachel!" Finn matched her volume as he now began pacing the floor. "I have no dream. I have no future... no idea what to do about it. I haven't been good enough for anything I've taken a shot at. And then there's you. You've moved on quite nicely. Unless that kiss goodbye that I was forced to witness while I literally threw up in my mouth was some sort of sick practical joke!"

Rachel flinched this time remembering how she had tried to get out of it, but was unable to without causing an even bigger uncomfortable scene or giving her heart's secret away. The secret that she held that with Finn Hudson in her life, there was never going to be room for anyone else. And she suddenly realized how silly it was that she was keeping it a secret in the first place. Pride just wasn't worth it anymore.

"I'm sorry about that. He knows I'm not happy about it," she said dismissively hoping to bypass this line of conversation. "But that's beside the point. The point is that you gave up on me when you snuck out in the middle of the night. Where was your faith in me, huh?"

Finn's face hardened. "Do you remember what you said to me after I proposed to you? You asked me why I was doing it and then said that you didn't need to marry me to keep from straying? That I was the only guy for you?"

"That's not fair, Finn! You broke up with me-"

"No I did-"

"Fine! Set me free... whatever! What was I supposed to do when the only guy for me didn't want me anymore?" she yelled, her voice cracking with emotion.

"Is that what you think? That I didn't want you anymore?" He was yelling now, too.

"What was I supposed to think? Finn, you sent me away and then dropped out of my life. I would have waited forever for you if you had told me that you needed time. But, you were a ghost. And I needed you. I needed you, Finn, and you weren't there." She couldn't stop her tears any longer and she wiped at them as if she were mad at them.

His heart broke to see her cry because this time he was seeing a new cry. A lost and broken cry, almost like a little girl. And all at once he knew he couldn't go to her because he had no right. "I'm so sorry I hurt you. I'm sorry I made you feel alone and I'm sorry I wasn't there. You didn't need me, Rach." he said, his own voice betraying him as it broke through his tears. "Turns out, I'm not your hero at all. I'm just some guy who turns a wrench who was stupid enough to believe I was more. You need so much more than me and when I was there watching you shine in my darkness I knew. Your dreams will always be bigger than me." Finn smiled the saddest smile Rachel had ever seen and walked past her. He stopped at the door, "I'm gonna go get some more wood for the fire." And he walked out into the frigid night.

Her eyes closed tight with the sound of the door closing gently behind him and tears streamed down her cheeks. As if seeing light for the first time she could see so clearly how he felt. He had certainly made mistakes and she wouldn't let him off the hook for some of them. But, she also knew how regretful he was. He would always be her hero. But, he was a broken man right now. A man who had literally lost everything. Even when she didn't have him at least she had her ambition and her dream. And when she really gave it thought she saw that her ambition had been his adversary for most of the time he had known her. It had been the only competition he had ever really had for her heart. And despite appearances to the contrary, he really had no other competition at the present. Because, who was she kidding? He stole her heart on a stage in Ohio years ago and it was his to keep... even if he broke it. He still cherished the gift of her heart more than any other person ever had and she knew how badly he must have been hurting to do it again. And she also knew that nothing he had done to hurt her was done with that purpose and she couldn't really say the same as of late. And she loved him. Of course she did. She always would. And the invisible pull between their hearts led her to the door. It led her outside and onto the porch where she stood watching him gather wood from behind. And when he dropped it all and leaned on the pile, his shoulders shaking, it led her through the snow that was whirling around her to stand behind him.

"Finn." She stated his name so sweetly and so tenderly and it caused him to turn.

His face was contorted with brokenness and it caused her to catch her breath. Snow dusted his forehead and his heavy breaths were coming out in white clouds between them. Without stopping to think better of it, Rachel took a step forward and rose up onto her toes, reaching her hand up to wipe the snow from his brow. His eyes closed when she touched him and a hint of a smile crossed her lips. She allowed her hand to remain on his skin, and her other hand came up to brush the other side, both hands trailing down his nose, under his eyes and down his cheeks. They traveled around to grasp the back of his head, pulling his forehead down to rest on her own.

"I love you," she whispered. "You don't have to do this alone anymore, OK? I'm here." Her words were mere breaths.

His arms came around her waist so tightly it was almost uncomfortable except that it was him and she had craved being this close to him for months. His face was buried in her neck and he was breathing her in in gasps. He lifted his face and searched her eyes for an explanation but he found all he needed when he saw the return of the look of love in them. Before anything could stop him, he kissed her. The softness of her lips and the way she immediately gave him ownership stirred his body into a state of desperate need and she responded with the same fervor. He lifted her, carrying her the short distance to his truck, sitting her on the hood. Her entire body wrapped around him and their hands were clutching each others hair, their kisses frantic and wild. Lips grabbed whatever was close... chins, necks, ears, cheeks. They became lost in the rediscovery until the cold began to bare down on them and Rachel pulled back. Both out of breath, she gently pushed him away and he helped her to the ground. He let her take the lead, not quite knowing what came next and watched her pick up a piece of wood that he had dropped earlier and hand it to him. He shook his head and smiled, bending to get the others. She slipped her hand through his arm and walked back inside with him. After Finn got the fire going again, Rachel led him back to bed, this time curling her body around him encased in his arms.

After a long silence, Finn spoke into the dark. "I don't understand what just happened."

Rachel gave her answer simply. "Forgiveness."

"Yeah? Just like that? You forgive me for all of it? Leaving you... twice? Telling you not to contact me? Being an ass at your apartment today? I'm so sorry for all of th-"

"Shhh," she said, her hand covering his mouth and receiving a kiss to her palm making her smile against his chest. "Yes... do you forgive me?"

"Always," he said without qualification or hesitation. After more silence he asked, "What about-"

"Zoolander?" she finished, both of them laughing. "That's nothing. I swear. It always was."

They lay in silence just taking in the sensation of being so close once again and exhaustion began to set in. "Finn, can we sort out the details in the morning? There's so much left to say but I'm so tired and I just want to enjoy this time."

He chuckled and pulled her closer if it was possible. "Sure. I just cannot believe I am holding you right now. It's like the best Christmas present ever."

"Oh my God! Merry Christmas, Finn!"

He laughed out loud. "Merry Christmas, Rachel."

She was almost asleep when she heard him say, "I'm really glad your flight was cancelled."

With a sleepy smile, she said, "I'm really glad I stink at navigating!"

They both laughed and Finn kissed her forehead causing her to turn her face up to receive his lips on hers. She kissed him slowly, lovingly, before she fell into peaceful sleep listening to his heartbeat.

There were many things to be discussed and neither of them knew for sure where to go from here, but one thing was certain. They would taking the journey side by side.

**OK... I did this one quickly so I hope it all tied together and wasn't too rushed. Angst is hard for me because I want them out of it quickly, but I was trying to follow the emotions I saw in my dream. I also think some of the conversation may be redundant from some of my other work, but it had to be in there to make this work. My main goal is to always have the events make sense and stay true to these characters so I hope it all came together for you like I meant for it to and I also hope I was able to stay balanced because I definitely see both their points and both their mistakes. Let me know what you think... And know that when I'm writing... I'm always thinking of you precious readers! 3 you guys!**


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